Transcript A Relational Perspective on how Network Actors Facilitate

Improving Customer Experiences
and Outcomes through Effective
Internal Relationship Efforts
Dr Sally Hibbert
Dr Vicky Story
Aims of the session:
• To introduce the notion of internal marketing,
• To outline key steps in an internal marketing campaign,
• To identify factors that promote and inhibit successful
relationships between internal partners,
• To consider the role of communication in internal
marketing.
Focusing on customer experiences at
Radisson Hotels
“Moments of truth”
• Telephone/e-mail inquiries,
• Reservation process,
• Airport transfer,
• Checking in, depositing keys,
• Local/tourist information,
• Food quality,
• Room service,
• Checking out, invoicing, bill payment,
• Use of leisure facilities,
• Use of electronic equipment (safe, TV, computers, wifi…)
Customer experience and outcomes
are shaped by internal and external
marketing
Internal Marketing
Backstage
employees
and depts.
Front-line
employee
Customer
experience
and outcomes
Service
Encounter
External Marketing
External
customers
Joseph, 1996
Internal Marketing
“Fundamental aims of internal marketing are to develop
internal and external customer awareness and remove
functional barriers to organisational effectiveness”
(Christopher, Payne and Ballantyne, 1991)
Internal customers:
any department or
unit that is served by
another unit within
the same organisation
Internal marketing
• Brings customer focus and service mindedness to the
whole organisation,
• Regards internal departments and units are
participative actors in the co-creation of value,
• Promotes collaboration and co-operation as a means to
achieve the organisation’s strategic goals.
Thinking in terms of “interaction,
relationships and networks”
opens up new possibilities for
value creation for the customer
Creating Value Through the Network
Key Internal Marketing Campaign Steps
1. The creation of internal awareness
2. The identification of internal customers and suppliers
3. The identification of expectations of the internal
customers
4. The communication of these expectations to internal
suppliers
– In order to discuss own capabilities / obstacles to meeting
requirements
5. Internal suppliers work to make necessary changes
6. Obtain measure for internal service quality and create
feedback loops to improve performance
Reynoso and Moores, 1996
Co-operation requires the delivery of both
service quality and partnership quality
Most relationships fail because they lack the social ingredients
that define collaborative success (Hutt and Stafford, 2000)
Relationship Success Variables
• Trust
• Commitment
• Performance
Satisfaction
• Mutual Goals
• Interdependence /
Power Imbalance
• Comparison Level of
Alternatives
•
•
•
•
Adaptation
Dialogue
Social Bonds
Empathy
The Importance of
Smoothing relational interaction and collaboration
Communication
• In theneed:
absence of relational history actors rely
Employees
• information
to be able to
on a repertoire
ofperform
techniques to smooth
tasks as service providers
relational interaction
• to communicate
any findings and collaboration. These
include
leveraging
personal
contacts,
regarding
external
customers
needs
• to communicate
own relationships, reigniting
mobilising their
existing
requirements/needs
dormant relationships, and using relationship
facilitators.
Two-way
communication enhances
performance
Discussion Exercise
• With reference to the service area for
which you work, imagine…
a) your service operates as an outsourced
supplier, i.e. it is an external network
partner - what behaviours would be
critical to satisfying your customers (&
securing repeat business)?
b) you work with outsourced suppliers of
support services, what behaviours do you
expect of them and what is required of
you as a customer to ensure that the
relationship is successful [bearing in mind
the suppliers have been selected on pricebased tenders]?
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